Seventy this year,
Pierre Bartholomée is a prominent
figure in Belgian contemporary music
although he also conducted and recorded
some more ‘classical’ works, albeit
rare ones such as symphonies by Tournemire.
As pianist and conductor who founded
the Ensemble Musiques Nouvelles and
as music director of the Orchestre Philharmonique
de Liège for nearly twenty years,
he did a lot to promote contemporary
music. At the helm of the OPL, he conducted
a huge number of important scores by
20th century composers. It
was he who introduced me to Takemitsu,
Boesmans, Pousseur, Vivier, George Benjamin
and many more. I particularly remember
a gripping performance of Xenakis’s
Aïs. He also made
a number of important recordings of
works by Boesmans, Pousseur, the late
and much-lamented Jean-Louis Robert
whose untimely death was a great loss
as well as Biarent, Tournemire and Vierne.
But he is – first and foremost – a composer
with a sizeable output to his credit.
Since his retirement, he has composed
- and still does – a number of works
including two operas (Oedipe sur
la route, first performed at
La Monnaie in 2003 and La Lumière
Antigone, to be first staged
at La Monnaie next season) and a handful
of substantial chamber works, some of
which are heard on this recent double
CD-set released to mark his 70th
birthday.

The earliest work here,
completed in 1999, is the scena for
soprano and large ensemble, LeRêve de Diotime
("Diotima’s Dream") on words
drawn from Henry Bauchau’s Diotime
et leslions. To certain
extent, it may be considered as a try-out
for the composer’s operas, both on librettos
by Henry Bauchau. Bauchau’s Diotima
is the daughter of Cyrus, king of Persia.
According to an old ritual, she is obliged
to confront the lions, actually her
mythological ancestors. In the passage
chosen by Bartholomée, Diotima
dreams that she is present at the fight
of the sailor Arsès, who must
also confront lions, but a huge wave
rises up out of the sea and threatens
to drown everything. The rather short
excerpt drawn from Bauchau’s text provides
Bartholomée with many grasped
opportunities for gripping, evocative
music and some very fine vocal writing.
A splendid work.

The other three works
were composed between 2002 and 2004
and amply demonstrate Bartholomée
‘s breadth and variety of vision. Fragments
des Belles Heures for soprano
and five players (alto flute, cor anglais,
bass clarinet, viola and harp) sets
eleven old medieval Flemish texts in
Liliane Wouters’ French translation.
All these settings, but the extended
opening ballad Chanson d’Halewyn
(Halewyn being some sort of near-cousin
of Bluebeard), are quite short. In spite
of the origin of the texts, Bartholomée
never attempts to imitate medieval music.
The composer constantly varies the songs’
accompaniment to reflect the various
moods suggested by these texts. The
full ensemble is used in the short interlude
about halfway into the cycle (actually
based on fragments from the opening
ballad), accompanies about half of the
settings and concludes the whole cycle
with a short instrumental epilogue.

The 13 Bagatelles
for piano completed in 2003 may be regarded
as the sequel to the composer’s slightly
earlier Variations for Piano
(1999). The whole set is rather more
like a series of varied studies exploring
a wide range of piano writing, often
rather demanding but making for some
highly accessible listening. The music
evokes a wide range of moods and characters,
serious and playful, often with some
typical Bartholomée pinch of
salt, which makes the whole immensely
enjoyable and rewarding.

The String Quartet
of 2004 is a fairly substantial work
in five movements, with a short, whimsical
Scherzo placed at the centre. Actually,
the entire work is laid-out in arch-form
with two pairs of fast and slow movements
framing the central Scherzo. The slow
movements, both marked Lent,
do not maintain a constant slow pace
throughout. They are characterised by
striking contrasts, in more animated
sections apparently at odds with the
main mood of the movement. For example,
the second slow movement opens with
nervous, troubled material followed
by or leading into some eerie, ghostlike
textures clashing with aggressive interjections.
The Finale eventually releases some
of the tension and the ambiguity accumulated
in the course of the work, albeit without
bringing any assertive conclusion. In
fact, the final movement – and the entire
work indeed – ends unresolved, with
a last question mark.

Although it may be
rather complex and strictly organised,
Bartholomée’s often beautiful
music is readily accessible, and primarily
concerned with direct communication,
without ever talking down. Here is a
composer in full command of his aims
and means, whose music is refreshingly
free from any modern ‘tricks and gimmicks’
that have once tended to disfigure contemporary
music with dramatic results in alienating
itself from its audiences. Make no mistake,
however, for there is nothing either
minimalist or post-modern in Bartholomée’s
finely made and sincerely felt music.
In any case, this generously filled
released is the best possible birthday
tribute to a most distinguished composer,
whose music definitely deserves wider
exposure.

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